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Ol' Sam. A Work in Progress.Ice Roads Truckers & stories and pictures from the 'Smokey and The Bandit' era. Yellowknife stories. Fishing Stories. Life in the Old Arctic. All Stories & Photographs are copyright & may not be copied &/or reproduced without express written permission.
July 04 Blackflies and Mosquitoes.Reading a discussion board this morning,
I noticed a couple of entries mentioning biting bugs in the North. Below for your entertainment, is a response I posted.
Jordan, you didn't mention that bull-dogs (moose/horse/deer flies) actually take a chunk of flesh outa ya. The mosquitoes can get bad enough to stampede a herd of caribou. In fact they constantly do.............
If you park on the causeway at the river at Ft Providence to wait for the ferry, the downwind side of your vehicle will literally be black with Blackflies while the upwind side will be clean as a baby's whistle. Mosquitoes bites, one can get used to, almost. Blackflies are the scourge of the north. Blackflies breed, hatch and hang around running water, definitely. In Yellowknife, just when one thought it safe, bugless, I've seen blackflies re-emerge after the first snow of fall, melts. Fortunately, I'm allergic to blackfly, mosquito and other biting/stinging insect bites & stings, so I always end up with beautiful itches, lumps and swellings. Blackfly bites are the worst for me, I get golf ball size lumps. Even up to a month later, old bites will flare up and itch like a bastard all over again, certainly. "Deep Woods Off" applied /sprayed directly to the face and exposed skin is a miracle. Pre-contact, how the natives lived without bug protection chemicals is a wonderment. The early explorers, Hudson's Bay Co. men etc., deserved medals for bravery by just continuing into bug infested lands. The best they had was stuff called citronella or kerosene... neither very affective. Head nets are a true inconvenience, specially for a smoker. Outdoors, exposing ones nether regions for any purpose, but mainly to perform the bodily functions of waste elimination, procreation etc. etc., can scar ones psyche and other soft bits for life. "Deep Woods Off" burns exposed mucus membranes. It's a rock and a hard place, I tell ya. Goodness gracious, Gerry Lee Lewis was absolutely correct!  The bug repelling qualities of a campfire/smoke myth, is exactly that, a myth. People believe it, want to believe it and light fires in the forlorne hope that it's true, it'll keep the bugs away. Biting bugs are actually attracted by campfires, cigarettes, pipes and joints, obviously. Lots of people (giant blood bags) stand/sit around campfires, flapping their arms, coughing, waiting to get bitten, eyes watering. Campfires emit a localized plume of movement, carbon dioxide and infra red, all three cues, biting blood sucking insects, use to home in on their intended prey, a fact. 1963. One breezy evening after work in Taloyoak (Spence Bay) NU. I decided to walk out to Middle Lake to do a little trout fishing. I'd walked for about an hour and was approaching the lake when the wind dropped to nothing, instantly, with every step I took, a cloud of mosquitoes rose from the low scrub of the tundra and headed for my face. Oh the humanity! I'd forgotten to bring or prespray myself with bug dope.
I had a ball cap on my head, but no hood on my jacket. Immediately my head, face and neck were surrounded by a biting, buzzing cloud of blood thirsty insects, naturally. Within 5 minutes they had me running crazily across the barren lands yelling, waving my hands and arms and dodging my own fish hook which seemed to mirror my hand and arm movements and seemed determined to rip off my hat, catch in my clothing or lodge in my eye, short term insanity began to rear it's ugly head.
But wait, what's that? I smell smoke. Smoke means people in the vicinity. Two million square miles of emptiness and I'd found someone. Undoubtedly, they would have bug dope! Three of the local Inuit boys were also out fishing that night and had stopped to light a fire and brew some tea. "Hello Agliqti, want some tea?', they asked as I charged up to them. "OK, but do you have any "Off", I forgot mine." "No, we forgot ours too." was the laughing response. With only their faces exposed they were wearing the hooded outer, Grenfell cloth, covers from their winter parkas and gloves for protection. I was almost at the point of berserk.
From somewhere, someone produced a bit of extra cloth, handy. There was just enough of it to fashion a basic head covering, enough to cover my neck and ears leaving only a small piece of my face exposed. My hands were naked, one hand carried my fishing rod, in the other I carried a .22 rifle, ducks dontchano?
Forget fishing, hands in my armpits I sat around the smudge in the bugs with the boys for a little while drinking tea, then headed back to the settlement. My only itch relief on the way home was to stop at a puddle or small lake occasionally and plunge my hands into near freezing water By the time I got home that night my swollen hands and face were on fire and covered in mud, and blood from squashed mosquitoes. My hands itched for a week after.
For the next 26 years, I never again forgot my bug dope when venturing out in the 'bush'. I've always been surprised by how quickly I succumbed to virtual craziness and running that night.
 June 23 Ice Road Blues.With my apologies to the Eagles. All alone at the end of the Highway The Aurora has faded to blue I bin thinking 'bout a woman who might have Loved me and I never knew You know I've always been a dreamer (spent my life running 'round) And it's so hard to change (Can't seem to settle down) But the dreams I've seen lately Keep on turning out and burning out And turning out the same So put me on an Ice Road And show me a sign And take it to the limit one more time You can spend all your time making money You can spend all your love making time If it all fell to pieces tomorrow Would you still be mine? And when you're looking for your freedom (Nobody seems to care) And you can't find the door (Can't find it anywhere) When there's nothing to believe in Still you're coming back, you're running back You're coming back for more So put me on an Ice Road And show me a sign And take it to the limit one more time Take it to the limit Take it to the limit Take it to the limit one more time. April 09 Life Change.On March 1st '08, I applied two Nicoderm patches (21mg & 14mg) to my arm and stopped smoking. I've gone from 35 cigs a day to zero. Since then I've gradually reduced my patch usage to a single 21mg diamond
 Nicoderm patch. I shall wear a 21mg patch for as long as it takes for me to stop thinking about smoking a cig. I may reduce eventually to 14mgs.So far, I notice some small personality changes. Gone is the tolerant, long suffering, easy going nice guy. In his place there is someone not quite a tolerant or sympathetic of your silly whining. The old Iceman of 30 years ago is simmering just below the surface...............however, I'm aware now of his existence and keep a close watch on him.
To date my extremely painful mouth cankers have not reappeared, a thing they have usually done instantly in the past whenever I've quit or tried to quit smoking.
At night I don't fall asleep as easily as I used to and if woken up, it seems like I have a bit or a hard time going back to sleep. The wild erotic dreams I had the first few nights when I first wore the patch, have to my chagrin, abated, however I still dream much more vividly than before I applied the patch. Every other night or so I dream I'm smoking a cigarette. When I have a smoking dream I'm pissed off in the dream that I'm smoking.
I keep a pack of Frisk Micro Mints handy and pop one when the old urge comes over me. They distract me instantly. Except..............yesterday I popped a mint in my mouth and promptly, automatically started reaching around for my lighter.
Even taking into account the cost of the patches, I'm saving in excess of two hundred dollars a month. Plus, I no longer cough my innards out when laughing at a joke or stringing more than six words together.
During the normal course of my day, I do not think much about smoking a cigarette.
Hopefully I'll never smoke another cigarette in my life.
Thank you for your support.
Cheers. February 23 Truck driver deaths on the Ice Road.Once and for all, let's set the record straight. Although "Ice Road Truckers" implies the number is 39, in reality, since the Ice Road(s), west between Yellowknife and Echo Bay Mines on Great Bear Lake, and East, between Yellowknife and the Diamond Mines (Ekati, Diavik and Snap Lake etc) were constructed, from about 1973 to the present day (June 2008), there have been NO truck driver deaths directly contributed to hauling freight on those Ice (Winter) Roads.
Since 1973, there have been three, and only three, deaths associated with the construction of said Road(s). One death of a grader operator, one death of a plow truck driver, and one death of a snocat operator (who subsequently died of heart failure after being rescued). Tragic accidents though they were, all three fatalities happened during the construction phase, before the Road was opened to heavy truck traffic.
Contrary to the "Ice Roads Truckers" series produced by the US History Channel, the job is neither a 'Job to Die For' nor 'A Dash for Cash'! No actual truck drivers on the Ice (Winter) Road have died by breaking through the ice! I know this is like barking up a dead horse's ass, but I had to post it anyway. Cheers. Sam. February 20 Fishin Magician.Well, a lovely day in the mountains again. Got to Osprey Lake shortly after 10, stayed til 3pm. I saw a few right Trout off the bat, then it got real slow for a while. When they came around, they'd look at my bait and keep going, I tried everything I had with me but they just weren't interested in biting it. So finally I dropped my flasher into the mud and did a bit of digging with it. Suddenly the bottom was crawling with Trout (small, medium and large), they really wanted to see what was going on. I'd dig, then lift my flasher up out of the mud cloud so they could see my bait.
Maggots, meal worms, rubber worms, plain jigs.....they still wouldn't bite. "Alright, fekk you guys, lets try this!" thinks I, slipping on my crawdad (Yabi pattern). Well, they went nuts for it and I caught two in short order. I'da caught more if the hook size had been smaller. That was around 2pm, after I caught the two the rest kinda lost interest and buggered oft, I lost interest at 3 and came home. But it sure was fun for a while watching the goings on down in the mud. I saw a couple of two to three pounders but always seemed to have Mr. Crawdad in the wrong spot when the big ones went by. I shall go again t'morra. I'm going to order some small rubber crawdads from the Fishin Hole this morning. February 13 Jake!Speaking of soot bombs. Ho-ho, don't let this happen to you. Cuties!
February 08 See what I mean?
February 06 A long and winding road.Hmmm, it'll be a real challenge building this one and very expensive. I can see moving the Winter Road off Marian Lake, but building an all weather road into these tiny settlements won't happen in my lifetime. I mean they still can't come up with the will, money or consensus to put a bridge over the Mackenzie River at Ft Providence.
New routes for Tlicho winter road considered.Last Updated: Wednesday, February 6, 2008 | 9:51 AM CTCBC NewsThe Northwest Territories government is asking people in Tlicho communities for help on picking a new route for the region's winter road. The current ice road crosses frozen lakes, rivers and ponds as it snakes its way north from Behchoko (Rae-Edzo) to the communities of Gameti (Rae Lakes), Whati (Lac La Marte) and Wekweeti (Snare Lake). Generally, it is open for two to three months every winter, and about 1,000 people rely on it for their groceries, supplies and fuel. Many of those people are concerned that climate change will affect their supply line. "People have been talking about it for a long, long time. They want to have an all-weather road," Gameti Chief Henry Gon told CBC News on Tuesday. "The weather has changed a lot and it's affecting the ice on the winter road." People in the Tlicho region have been calling for an all-season road since 2001. Over the summer, department staff conducted engineering and environmental studies to figure out what their options are. Those options were shown to residents in a government information session held in Whati on Tuesday evening. "I think what we're going to be trying to get as much as possible is a fair bit of traditional knowledge. People that live there obviously know quite a bit more about the land than we might here in Yellowknife," said Michael Conway, the department's North Slave regional superintendent. "[We're] looking at things like river crossings and creeks and high water marks and all those types of things that affect where we might put a route one day." Conway said he plans to gather information and feedback from across the Tlicho region over the next couple months, hopefully whittling down a list of possibilities to two or three workable options for the new winter road route. Moving the winter road could take three to five years, he said. January 26 Global Warming.............me arse!Thursday: Jan. 24th. '08. The thermometer on my deck this morning indicated -18°C when I got up at 06:00. Oh Man!! Driving up the Trout Creek road it got colder and colder! Just before we came out of the canyon shadow, Mark's truck said it was -26°C! (-12°F). At Link Lake, at dawn it had warmed up a bit, to only -20°C. We fished til 12:30 and only saw 3 fish all morning. Didn't even get a bite. It was/is still -8 at Link when we left and when we got back down here. F-E-K-K! Cold. Those are the coldest temps I've seen in the Okanagan, since we moved here 20 years ago. http://www.theweathernetwork.com/index.php?product=weather&placecode=cabc0282 January 21 Lac La Marte.I like Flats, vans/boxes... not so much. Never hauled steel coils, but I have hauled, insulated and wrapped steel pipe, and galvanized culverts (small nested into large). Both were a challenge to secure and get to stay on the deck. Culverts especially when nested. They like to walk ahead or backwards, they sorta unscrew, each must be secured separately. Boxes usually involve 'inside' work by the driver. One winter I got elected to haul a box of groceries and misc school supplies into Lac La Marte, a small native settlement on a side road west, off our main winter road. Thirty years ago, La Marte resembled one of those old towns you see in Westerns. Newer buildings, some log cabin and shacks......but one 'street', houses along each side, a church and a school at one end....no other infrastructure, replace horses with dogs and you get the picture. There were three or four of us, I forget exactly how many, in our little convoy or what the others guys were hauling. For sure one would have had a 5000 gal. tank of diesel. We arrived early on a Saturday or Sunday morning after having driven all night over a very rough, mostly portage, access road. No one was in their 'happy place'. We drove up the middle of the street and stopped, expecting someone (perhaps the settlement manager!), to come out and at the very least, say hello. Even though we could see the occasional window curtain twitch, not a soul appeared, not even the local Catholic priest. None of us had been there before, no one knew what building to deliver our loads to or even where to ask. We waited for a polite length of time to give folks time to get dressed and used to our presence, but still no one appeared. After an hour, in exasperation a couple of us laid on our air-horns. It was like a ghost town, still no one came out to greet us. Ok, what the hell are we going to do with these loads? How the heck will we get these loads off the trailers? Even if I knew where to take them, how am I going to unload a van full of groceries by myself? By now it was obvious that the locals were deliberately ignoring us and hiding in their homes coz they didn't want to work helping us unload 'their' supplies. Lazy bunch of bastards! Now I was seriously pissed-off. What to do? Well I knew what I was going to do...... my load was palletized. Getting out, grabbing several lengths of chain and walking to the back of my van I opened the doors. I looped one chain end through a pallet and got the driver behind me to pull up close enough to hook the other end of the chain onto his bumper hook. Getting back in my rig I pulled ahead a bit til the guy behind blew his horn, and in my mirrors I could see boxes come flying sideways behind my rig. We repeated this process up the street till my van was empty. Every time a pallet of goods came out, it hit the ground hard and spilled its contents all over the place, boxes of groceries, school tables and chairs from one end of the street to the other. What a mess, it was going to take quite some time and amount of hand 'bombing' to clean it up. We were mad and didn't care, we certainly weren't going to be the ones to do it. I think what made us the maddest was the rudeness. "That'll teach 'em to hide in their house and ignore us." Somehow during the operation, by overextending it, I'd managed to pull the tendon off the last joint of the little finger of my right hand, it was swollen, throbbing, I couldn't bend it and of course kept banging it on everything. It still doesn't straighten properly. I can't remember what the other guys were hauling or how they got their loads off , but I'm sure it wasn't a pretty operation. I think their loads must have been 'simple' ones. Whatever, by common consent as soon as I was unloaded, I jack-knifed my rig around in the street and got the hell outa there. I was expecting to get flack later, about how we unloaded my truck and what a mess we made, but curiously never a cross word was ever said. Banana Tankers. Now there's a thing! January 18 Why I wasn't here at 'work' yesterday.Me and the Boys went fishing.
Quarter to eight as usual, we met at the A&W, John and I parked our trucks and piled in with Mark in his 4x4. A quick show of hands vote, and we headed up the backroad from Summerland to Princeton, destination Link Lake. Actually a destination vote wasn't really necessary, we'd been impressed by the size of the lunkers we saw last time we were at Link and all wanted to go back for another crack at them.
Having been ploughed and sanded within the last week, for a nice change, the road was in pretty good shape. 25K up and just before we got to the Trout Creek Ranch, John spotted a moose lying down in its bed close off the road. It was quite close to where we'd seen two of them on our last trip. We stopped and I took his photo, once again he wouldn't stick around to sign autographs. Just on the other side of the Ranch we saw another one, he stood til we stopped, then as I took photos, he began to amble away. He jumped over the fence, catching one hind leg on the top strand. He stood for a minute looking at us, then shaking it, got his leg off the wire and wandered away up the hill. Off we went again til just at the third bridge there was one more moose, for a total of three sightings that morning. That one saw us coming and all we saw of him was his arse end heading into the willows. No Picture.
We got to Link, unloaded our gear and walked down the hill to the lake. There was a lot more snow than a week ago. Perhaps a foot more. Walking along about a hundred feet out I could feel water below the snow under my feet. No worries, just hard walking through the overflow. The weight of the fresh snow on the ice, pushes it down forcing water up through any recently drilled fishing holes, of which there were several. It just doesn't get cold enough here for the temp under the snow to get low enough to re-freeze overflow.
Walking along we came across a recently drilled hole, it must have had a gusher because the snow and ice surrounding it were covered in 'scuds' (small fresh water shrimp). Hmmm, that didn't look good for our fishing. If there are that many scud around, there is no shortage of food for the fish to feeding on. John quickly drilled a hole close to the gusher, but hit lake bed right away so we kept walking.
We kept walking til we got out of the overflow and to the same location we were last time. Three holes were quickly drilled and we set up our 'blinds'. Perfect, we had four to six feet of water depth under about two feet of ice, a nice flat bottom with a low carpet of dormant weeds. Quite quickly we started seeing fish swim lazily by. Lazy is the word and no real big ones this time. They'd cruise by and if our hook was exactly at their nose level in front of them they might take a look at it or have a sniff. They definitely weren't too interested in feeding. Sometimes they'd mouth the bait, have a lick and immediately spit it out. They were not excited by what we were offering. Eventually, Mark found something that worked for about half an hour, catching three in that space of time, John managed to entice a keeper and I caught one little of that went back down the hole as soon as I got him off the hook. We fished til noon, seeing small schools swim by, then right when the solunar tables/calendar predicted a minor feed, they all disappeared. After that, except for a couple of 'minners', we didn't see a dang thing before we left to come home at two thirty.
Oh well, we had fun, no one got skunked and it turned into a beautiful day up there. The afternoon temp soared to a balmy +4°C and the sun shone for half the time. Bare handed all day, in my 'blind' it was warm enough, I took off my jacket. Due to a temperature inversion it was warmer on top of the mountains than it was down in the Okanagan Valley. Coming back down we could quite clearly see all the woodstove smoke and smog trapped under the warm air layer.
Next week the calendar/tables say, about four days of good fishing, so we'll be going up again for at least one of those days. I want to catch one of those six pounders we saw! January 11 Passed away.Sorry to say. This morning I received word that Paul Clark, my old friend and co-worker at RTL, passed away on Jan 3rd '08. Tuff as they come and a good friend, I'm sure Paul will be missed by all who knew him.
My condolences to his family. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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, and some service on the truck. Still basically in its infancy RTL didn't even have a proper wash rack. On Sunday after the truck had been serviced I decided to take it down town and use one of the commercial wash racks there. 
Oh wow, I was strutting around like a rooster. So, proud as Punch I got ol' # 16 all shiny and looking like new again. She was a beaut!
Mortified and pretending I'd meant to do that
.................. I had to wash the whole top side of the truck again. Those little diesel soot particles are a bugger! They stick where they land and, if you touch them with a rag they just smear. 
It was past supper time and another four bucks, before I got the truck cleaned up again. My groupies for some reason, had lost interest and were long gone. 
